Plans to ease India’s strict rules on foreign investment to permit the entry of foreign supermarkets drew a step closer last night, after the leader of one of the country’s most powerful regional parties said that she would support the Government in a key parliamentary vote on the issue.

The decision by Mayawati, the so-called queen of the low-caste Dalits who is leader of the Bahujan Samaj Party, virtually assures that the reforms will be passed in a critical vote in the Parliament’s upper house today.

“Our party will vote in favour of the Government tomorrow,” Mayawati said during a